Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem

U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem visited the El Salvador prison on Wednesday, a Venezuelan who the Trump administration calls a member of the gang who has been detained since the U.S. was removed from office. The trip consisted of two crowded cell blocks, the Armory and an isolation unit.

Noem's trip to prison – prisoners are packed into cells and never allowed outside – the Trump administration is trying to show that it is expelling people described as “the worst person.”

The Trump administration argued in federal court that it makes sense to send Venezuelans to El Salvador, and human rights activists say officials have sent them to prisons, suffering human rights violations.

In prison, Noem visited a Venezuelan area accused of being a member of the gang. In the sultry building, people wearing white T-shirts and shorts stare quietly from their cells without making a sound.

As Neum left the building, the men could be heard shouting an inseparable ode.

In a cell holding El Salvador prisoners, about twelve were lined up by the guards in front of the cell and told to remove their T-shirts and masks. The men had tattoos on their chests, some of which were letters MS from the Mara Salvatrucha gang.

After listening to the El Salvadorian officials, Neum transferred her back to the cell and recorded a video message.

If immigration crime is committed, “this is one of the consequences you may face,” Noam said. “First, don’t come to our country illegally. You will be removed and you will be prosecuted. But knowing that the facility is one of the tools in our toolkit, we will use it if you commit crimes against the American people.”

In a post on Wednesday, the Department of Homeland Security said it would continue to work with El Salvador, saying Noam plans to discuss how the United States “increase the number of violent criminals flying from the U.S. deportation from the U.S.” during his visit with President Nayib Bukele.

Since taking office, Noem has often been an effort to highlight immigration repression. She participated in immigration enforcement operations, rode horses with Border Patrol agents, and was the face of a television campaign, warning people in the country to deceive themselves illegally.

Noem's Wednesday visit was part of a three-day trip. She will also travel to Colombia and Mexico.

Venezuelans were evacuated this month after Trump invoked the Alien Enemy Act of 1798 and said the United States was invaded by the Tren de Alagua gang. The Foreign Enemy Act grants wartime presidents powers and allows deportation of non-citizens without the opportunity to go to immigration or federal court judges.

Amid the setbacks against the government, the Court of Appeal held an order on Wednesday prohibiting the government from deporting more Venezuelan immigrants to El Salvador under the Foreign Enemy Act.

A centrally distinguished question about the status of being deported is when and how they release it from prison, called the terrorist incarceration center, because they do not serve their sentences. They no longer appear in online detention centers for U.S. immigration and customs enforcement, nor before judges in El Salvador.

The Trump administration calls them “the worst case scenario,” but has not yet determined who has been deported or provided evidence that they are members of the gang.

Relatives of some expelled persons have absolutely denied any gang affiliation. The Venezuelan government and a group that dispatches the families of the Venezuelan Immigration Commission have hired a lawyer to help free people held by El Salvador. The company's lawyers currently represent about 30 Venezuela, who are not gang members and have no criminal record.

The U.S. government has admitted that many people do not have such a record.

On March 15, a federal judge issued a verbal order to temporarily ban deportation and order planes to return to the United States.

The Trump administration argued that the judge's verbal instructions did not count as following his written orders only and could not be applied to flights that had already left the United States.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters that about 261 people were expelled, including 137 people from the Alien Enemies Act.

Bukele opened a prison in 2023 as he made the stark prison in Central American countries a trademark of his battle against crime. The facility has eight sprawling pavilions that can accommodate up to 40,000 prisoners. Each cell can fit between 65 and 70 prisoners.

Prisoners cannot have tourists. There are no seminars or educational programs.

El Salvador has no diplomatic relations with Venezuela since 2019, so Venezuelans imprisoned there have no consular support from the government.

The videotape released by the El Salvador government, released after the arrival of the deportee, showed the plane being driven toward the airfield apron lined by the officers in the riot equipment. The men's hands and ankle ropes were shaking and they struggled to walk as the police pushed down.

They were later shaved while kneeling on the ground in the prison, then shaved and replaced with the prison's all-white uniform – knee-length shorts, T-shirts, socks and rubber clogged and placed in the cell.

El Salvador has been operating in a state of emergency for three years, and the state has suspended fundamental rights as Buckley launched a full-scale attack on the country's powerful street gangs. During this period, about 84,000 people were arrested, charged with gang tie and often sentenced to jail without proper procedures.

When U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio visited in February, Buckler proposed to deport the United States to prison.

In the prison Wednesday, El Salvadorian Attorney General Gustavo Villatoro showed Noem a cell, he said the El Salvadorians said they have been there since the jail opened. “No one expects these people to come back to society and act,” he said.

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